What were your big lightbulb moments?

[Jukeshoe]

I'm about to peak all over some MN courses this weekend

Be safe!

 

[Riverdog]

Sorry.... just recovering from a seizure. ^^^^^^

Biggest for me was the first time I threw a golf disc, a Comet, and thought, "Damn! That was cool!!"[emoji41]


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[azplaya25]

"Elbow Out"

I had always had a bad habit of dropping the elbow of my throwing arm down toward my hip, which results in a weak T-Rex throw. The common que of "Elbow UP" hadn't clicked for me. I was exaggerating the "up" during the reach back, which caused me to naturally drop it during the forward swing. That resulted in either nasty nose-up air-bounces or immediate throw-llers.

What finally clicked was envisioning keeping my elbow as far away from my body as possible. This que worked better for me, because it's always aligned with the axis of rotation and is more directly related to the actual goal (make the upper arm the longest lever possible). This instantly improved my nose angle as a side-benefit.

Not sure how I missed this but this is fantastic . I've been doing the same thing, keeping the elbow high in their reachback, then throwing terrible nose up flex shots or throllers. I can see now how high elbow in reach back is going to lead to elbow drop on the forward swing. Great advice

 

[banzai7]

Using your rear leg and hip to 'brace' in the backswing! If you resist your CoG going too far over your rear foot, you have an easy/faster weight shift 'from behind'. Q: How can you completely weight shift before the downswing without going over the top of your front foot? A: Don't tip over your rear foot in the backswing. (It feels like there is way less rotation of the pelvis than I always thought.)

Similarly in an X-step, if you pop your front hip 'to the sky' during the pump (a la MacBeth), it presets the correct feel for the brace and makes the rear hip leg feel tight and powerful in the backswing. Basically just rock your hips. ��

 

[BuzzzChief]

Seeing my putt on video was a big lightbulb moment for me. I was a super streaky putter and when I saw that video, I realized why. SO many moving parts. Timing needed to be perfect. I see a lot of beginner players doing the same thing, trying to get more zip on their putts. Elbow, wrist, fingers, knees, all bending and straightening at the same time. Plus then they're trying to jump or step everything from circle's edge. It's impossible to be consistent with so much movement.

Generally, good putters have clean, simple movements. Not a lot of moving parts.

 

[Mocheez]

Lots of small breakthroughs over the years got me to my current plateau. Most recently I realized I was landing on the side of my plant foot and rolling it to flat. Landing toe to heel flat on the ground has made it much easier to brace and resist. My right hip doesn't feel jammed anymore. Also explains why I could throw close to my max distance on one leg.

 

[sidewinder22]

Lots of small breakthroughs over the years got me to my current plateau. Most recently I realized I was landing on the side of my plant foot and rolling it to flat. Landing toe to heel flat on the ground has made it much easier to brace and resist. My right hip doesn't feel jammed anymore. Also explains why I could throw close to my max distance on one leg.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jg3p2D2GlCg

 

[TiltedFlipCurves]

I got nothing. The more I read or watch the more confused I get.

 

[Countchunkula]

It's finger spring , important for putting but also the way people get so much distance with the fan grip. You can get a feel for it by just grabbing a heavy book and tossing it on your couch. Then do the exact some thing with a disc. So much of this sport is just tricking your mind to believe the disc is a heavier object. That's probably my lightbulb moment, except that I haven't figured out how to trick my mind while out on the course lol

I definitely use the finger spring while putting. When I'm missing low, it's usually because I mistime the spring. I can't imagine ever getting to the point where I could add that to a drive and time it right consistently though.

Fan grip users, are you actively adding push with your fingers just before the disc comes out?

Spoiler

I think not.

 

[sidewinder22]

I definitely use the finger spring while putting. When I'm missing low, it's usually because I mistime the spring. I can't imagine ever getting to the point where I could add that to a drive and time it right consistently though.

Fan grip users, are you actively adding push with your fingers just before the disc comes out?

Spoiler

I think not.

IDK if it's active or reactive, but I feel them spring on drives.

 

[Countchunkula]

^Well, that changes my thinking. Thanks, SW.

 

[RFrance]

My biggest breakthrough was simple, SLOW DOWN. I had no throwing sports background and was completely ignorant of the biomechanics and the kinetic chain. Only after slowing down did the concepts of: feeling the weight of the disc, using centrifugal force, bracing, using the arm as a whip, lateral verses rotational forces, etc. start to make sense because I could finally feel them. I still find myself tapping the brakes.

The second part is that it takes time and lots of study to understand biomechanics and the kinetic chain if you've never been exposed to it before.

 

[Mocheez]

You can try to push the disc with your little/ring/middle fingers or do it with your thumb and index as the main control.

Calvin Finger Push


Eagle Thumb Push

 

[Slaigh]

I can't really call them all 'lightbulb moments', but some things I've noticed since beginning a few years ago:

- S-Curving a Star Destroyer 200' was not a natural flight path
- Form, disc choice, and shot shape matters. Like, a friggin' lot..
- Hard and fast run-up != farther throws. Slow down
- A whip cracks the sound barrier far easier than a tense, muscled up karate chop
- Hitting 400' 3/10 throws with 60° of spread is worthless compared to hitting 250' 8/10 throws with 15° of spread
- Blowing up form this year has lost me ~100' of distance, but increasing accuracy has been more than making up for it
- Playing putter/midrange rounds improved my form far more than 20 hours of heaving max DDs as hard as I could across a field
- Eliminating most rounding + Simon's 'plant foot forward' stance gave me an extra 40' or so to play around with
- Having a 2.6+ PPH was killing me. Just dropping it to 2.2 over the past couple months has already been a big confidence boost. Turns out putting practice is important :doh:
- Anger kills scores. I'm naturally angry (Got that red-head temper), so finding ways to keep cool after bad shots has been a hard, but useful addition to my game
- Tournament jitters are absolutely BONKERS. My first (and only) tournament I walked in with my big bad 900 DGCR rating thinking I'd finish at least in the top quarter of the REC field. NOPE. Finished 4th from last with a 716 rated +18 round
- There's probably also something to be said there about confidence vs over-confidence..
- Head movement. It's just recently clicked for me to let my shoulders bring my head around instead of just staring at the disc the whole throw
- Also a recent one, using discs for my arm. Throwing an Inertia on it's natural flight path to a 320' basket just feels so much easier than flexing a Shryke to the same spot

 

[azplaya25]

I definitely use the finger spring while putting. When I'm missing low, it's usually because I mistime the spring. I can't imagine ever getting to the point where I could add that to a drive and time it right consistently though.

Fan grip users, are you actively adding push with your fingers just before the disc comes out?

Spoiler

I think not.

Not sure on active or reactive, but it should happen quite naturally. If you are gripping and swinging properly, that finger spring happens without really trying and you can add to it. I think it's important for people to really establish a good, passive hit before they start trying to add to it. I took a major step backwards by trying to add to the acceleration before I had built up the muscle memory to let it happen naturally. So instead of adding to the acceleration I was just strong arming and screwing the whole system up lol

 

[Countchunkula]

My biggest breakthrough was simple, SLOW DOWN. I had no throwing sports background and was completely ignorant of the biomechanics and the kinetic chain. Only after slowing down did the concepts of: feeling the weight of the disc, using centrifugal force, bracing, using the arm as a whip, lateral verses rotational forces, etc. start to make sense because I could finally feel them. I still find myself tapping the brakes.

The second part is that it takes time and lots of study to understand biomechanics and the kinetic chain if you've never been exposed to it before.

There was a guy on DGR whose sig was something like: Slow is smooth, smooth is fast, fast is far.

Maybe not 100% accurate, but easy to remember.

 

[RFrance]

There was a guy on DGR whose sig was something like: Slow is smooth, smooth is fast, fast is far.

Maybe not 100% accurate, but easy to remember.

I wonder if that was Danny Lindahl since his catch phrase is "Slow is smooth, smooth is far."

 

[Parbequeue]

Lots of small breakthroughs over the years got me to my current plateau. Most recently I realized I was landing on the side of my plant foot and rolling it to flat. Landing toe to heel flat on the ground has made it much easier to brace and resist. My right hip doesn't feel jammed anymore. Also explains why I could throw close to my max distance on one leg.

WOW. Thankyou sir! (So obvious in crush the can but never saw it that way)

 

[azplaya25]

This is more of a lightbulb about goal setting with form work that I had recently...if you are trying to improve your distance , going to the field trying to hit a specific distance goal is really not beneficial. You often end up frustrated and just reinforcing whatever bad habits are holding you back. Instead, try going to the field with a goal of hitting the same distance you have been throwing, but with 20% less effort. Focusing on less effort will keep you loose and get you to slow down and you'll probably end up smoothing one out there 40 feet further than you've ever thrown.

 

[azplaya25]

Calvin Finger Push


Eagle Thumb Push

Solid gifs!
I like watching Barsby. His putt and upshot are one in the same